1993 IMO Problems/Problem 3

Revision as of 18:06, 21 November 2023 by Tomasdiaz (talk | contribs) (Solution)

Problem

On an infinite chessboard, a game is played as follows. At the start, $n^2$ pieces are arranged on the chessboard in an $n$ by $n$ block of adjoining squares, one piece in each square. A move in the game is a jump in a horizontal or vertical direction over an adjacent occupied square to an unoccupied square immediately beyond. The piece which has been jumped over is removed. Find those values of $n$ for which the game can end with only one piece remaining on the board.

Video Solution

This is a very beautifully done video solution: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAROaUpkgRo Even though he made a mistake when reducing the 5x5 to a 2x2 as someone pointed out in the comments.

Solution

IMO1993 P3 n1r.gif IMO1993 P3 n2r.gif IMO1993 P3 n3r.gif

IMO1993 P3 n4r.gif IMO1993 P3 n5r.gif IMO1993 P3 n6r.gif

IMO1993 P3 n7r.gif IMO1993 P3 n8r.gif IMO1993 P3 n9r.gif

IMO1993 P3 n10r.gif

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See Also

1993 IMO (Problems) • Resources
Preceded by
Problem 2
1 2 3 4 5 6 Followed by
Problem 4
All IMO Problems and Solutions